This is an Omake for the fic 'Chaos Cannot Be Denied,' a Spacebattles fic by Anonymouse. RWBYxWarhammer 40k.
I highly recommend it in the sense of being something horribly uncomfortable at times. It's a locomotive out of control, and the wreck hasn't come yet.
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Sleep did not come.
Blake had always been a light sleeper. The product of waking up one too many times with a boot in her ribs, or to the sound of an oh-so-cheery human police officer wondering just what a pretty girl like her was doing in this part of town.
There were feline traits she had, and some that she didn't. Catnapping was not one of them.
Since she'd made her pact, it had become even less so. Mostly because her new eye could see through her eyelid. Flesh was insubstantial when reality itself unfolded for her. Closing her eyes just added another layer of pulsating muscle and throbbing blood vessels for her to try and decode on top of the onion skin that was the world.
She gave up trying at… she checked her scroll. 3 am. The building Eliphas had them holed up in today was someone's house. The interior room she'd chosen was windowless though.
It was growing stuffy, and any attempt at sleep had failed around the point where she had drifted off enough to let her control slip and her eye unfocus. It was like jamming the wrong pair of glasses on and staring into a kaleidoscope. If instead of colors, it was psychic currents and four-dimensional space having a bastard child with time.
It had been only an instant, but she shot up in bed, wide awake, her heart pounding unpleasantly. Even now, the dual pupils were aching, twitching and moving on her eye like two amoebas.
Blake tossed the covers aside and rose. Gambol Shroud came to her hand with the barest twitch of telekinesis, and she slipped it onto her back. She'd never held any special affection for it, not like Ruby had, but it was hers, and it had seen her through a lot. Now though… it pulsated against the small of her back, oscillating hot and cold and hungry and other things too esoteric to qualify in such a way. She was beginning to understand what Ruby had seen in Crescent Rose.
She exited the bedroom, padding through the darkened house. Scents mingled in the halls. The owner's and others. Some familiar, some not. She didn't need any real intuition or even the way her eye perceived the currents in the Warp, like footprints in sand, to find Yang.
The other girl was sitting in the family room, elbows on knees, head down.
Blake let herself make a noise as she approached.
Yang looked up. Her eyes were always red now, glowing faintly through the dark.
"Blake." Her voice was hoarse. There was none of the vibrancy Blake was used to. "Couldn't sleep?"
Blake shook her head. "Can I?" She gestured to the seat beside Yang on the sofa.
"Sure."
She sat.
Silence fell. Blake waited for Yang to speak. They were, after all this, still partners, and she could read Yang like a book.
"...so." Yang wasn't looking at her. "Things are… kinda fucked up."
Blake said nothing.
"I- it's like everything fell apart. Eliphas changed everything, and I just… I don't even know anymore."
"Yeah." Blake knew. She wondered if Yang had any mutations yet.
"The Vytal Festival is in a week, and all I can think about is what's going to happen. Everything- everyone we know is going to change, and all- the only thing I can think about is that I get to go up there in front of a million people and just fucking murder someone."
Yang turned to face her. Her hands were working in her lap, clenching and unclenching, cracked knuckles splitting already. She started to say something else, shook her head.
And then she laughed, once, sharply.
"I'm fucking excited about it. Can you believe it? Like- it's how I'd used to feel about combat practice, only instead of winning, I'm going to- to just-" Yang made a violent twisting motion with her hands. She laughed again, then sagged, her hands dropping.
"It's all I can think of," she repeated. "Couldn't even sleep, because I kept getting amped up. There's a hole in the mattress because my semblance kept flaring, and I couldn't- so I just… I went outside."
There was something terrible in her red eyes now, and Blake flinched at the way Yang's soul was writhing under her skin.
"What happened then?"
Yang snorted. "You're the psychic witch. You tell me."
She didn't like looking at Yang with her eye. Really looking. Unfolding her like a puzzle and examining her piece by piece. It was a violation. Blake could see the violation. The way everything that made Yang Yang was being slowly burned away in her rage like dead wood.
"You got in a fight," Blake said slowly. "And..." Yang's hands convulsed again, and Blake could see the blood caked under the nails this time. "How many did you kill?"
"One. Just some random… just some guy. Homeless, probably. He- he looked nice until I hit him. Didn't really fight back. And-" Yang's voice hitched. "I hit him until he stopped moving, and then I kept going. He had this stupid fucking… flower t-shirt on, and all I could think about was Ruby Rose, and- I kept on going."
She folded over in her seat, hands clutching her head, running through her hair. There were already streaks of blood there.
Gently, moving so Yang could see her, Blake reached out and laced her fingers into Yang's hair. She began stroking gently, combing it with her fingers.
They'd never really gotten anywhere before all of this began. Together, that was. But just once, they snuggled in bed, and Yang had let her do this, let Blake touch her like she was now.
That night seemed so far off now. A laughing blonde with playful eyes and hair like cornsilk. Every inch of it was well-cared for as the rest of her. Her pride and joy.
It was tangled now, not just clotted with blood, but knotted and matted into a filthy mane. Her fingers were dirty just touching it.
It wasn't working. There was no hair to comb that hadn't already been ruined.
Blake stopped.
Yang looked at her again. Smiled brokenly. "Yeah, I thought so."
"No."
"'No' what?"
Blake rose and held out her hand to Yang. "Let's go upstairs."
Yang frowned at her. "What? I- what are you talking about, Blake? I just told you I murdered someone, and you're-"
And Blake put her thumb to Yang's lips. She leaned down and pressed her nose into Yang's hair, inhaling deeply.
She smelled like blood. Blood and sweat and gunpowder and leather.
And faintly, beneath it all, a hint of lilac perfume and the acrid oil she polished Ember Celica with. Not gone yet.
"I don't care."
Yang shifted beneath her, but Blake caught her this time, hands to shoulders.
"I don't care who you killed," she whispered, breath hissing through Yang's hair. "Just as long as you're okay. That was why I followed you this far. I've spent my entire life trying to change things, Yang Xiao Long, and now I'm finally in a place I can do that.
"But… more than that, what I want is… I want you and me and Weiss and… and Ruby, I want us to be together. No matter what happens."
Yang tensed. "Ruby's gone."
"Then we'll be the ones to save her."
Whatever violation had been done to Yang or herself, it was nothing to the rape Ruby had undergone. There was nothing left of her but a walking corpse too stubborn to lay down. A thing wearing her face.
"I'll do it," Yang snapped. "She's my sister."
Blake released her and stepped back. Their eyes met. "Then I'll be there to pick up the pieces."
She held out a hand again. "Let's go upstairs. You're gross. You need a shower. It'll make you feel better."
Yang didn't move.
"Destroying yourself now won't make it any easier next week."
Yang gave her a flat look.
"I'll wash your hair."
Her eyes widened slightly. The red didn't flicker, but it dimmed slightly. Just a hair.
Yang's mouth twitched, and then she gave a weak shadow of a grin. "I thought cats didn't like water."
And then she reached out and took Blake's hand. Blake pulled her partner off the couch, and for a moment, they stood pressed together. Yang's arms twitched, then slowly came up to close around Blake. Her fingers knotted in Blake's shirt. Don't let go.
Blake leaned in, her ears tickling Yang's chin, and closed her eyes.
XXX
This was going to be something with Weiss as well, but it didn't quite fit in with how it worked out. And I don't think we've even seen Weiss in like ten chapters anyway. Kinda envisioned a similar conversation between her and Blake, but more in the sense of bandaging wounds, because Weiss has been practicing relentlessly, and every time she fucks up, she self-injures as punishment, because Slaanesh, and of course she does.
Leaving Weiss out kind of ruined my idea of a Blake/Yang/Weiss thing, but eh, I'm happy with this how it is.